The Dream Beach

         For the fourth night in a row, Simon found himself standing at the water’s edge as the sea’s salty fingers washed the spaces between his toes and the shoreline’s constant breezes tugged playfully at his shaggy, dark blond hair. Strangely, Simon himself seemed to shift, less real than the sand under his feet and less tangible than the smell of sea salt. He could be any age, any height, his hair any length. It did not seem to matter in this place – the only thing that mattered was the place itself, or rather the way that place made him feel.

         The dream beach stretched on in either direction, endless, a sandy universe beyond the reach of time and humankind. He never saw any sign of other humans on the beach; the place was somehow undiscovered, unmarked by litter or tire tracks. He had never felt so alone as he did here, so untouchable, so whole and unmolested. His long walks down the beach seemed to last forever, years and years, a lifetime at least, and yet he never tired. He only walked on under the gentle sun of an eternal summer’s day.

         That’s why he was always surprised to find that but a single night had passed when he awoke at last to find himself at home in bed. He awoke before the alarm and dressed silently for school, preserving the peace of the dream beach in the stillness of five thirty in the morning. He closed his eyes and could almost feel the wind in his hair. The moment was shattered when Simon’s mother, expecting to wake her sleepy teenage son, burst uninvited into the room. She paused in the doorway, her mouth hanging open slightly.

         “Oh -” she said. “Oh, you’re up then.” She studied him, perhaps checking for signs of illness or insanity, surely the only irritants capable of forcing Simon out of bed earlier than necessary. “Bus in half an hour,” she reminded him gruffly before striding down the hall to wake his younger brother Julian. He was alone again, but the dream beach was lost, anyway. Heaving a mighty sigh, Simon stomped down the stairs for breakfast.

         The school bus was noisy and uncomfortable, as all school buses are. Leaving Julian to find a seat in the front with the other freshmen, he threw his bag down into an empty seat and threw himself down beside it, slouching and staring out the window. His friend Aaron took the seat across the aisle and mumbled a greeting full of morning cloudiness, which Simon barely acknowledged.

         All day, Simon was distracted from his classes by the inherent dirtiness of his surroundings. Water from the water fountains tasted strangely metallic, the air seemed full of smoke and exhaust fumes, and most of all, there was so much noise. Having grown accustomed to the silence of the dream beach, he was deafened by the chatter of his fellow students, the raised voices of his lecturing teachers, even the dropping of a pencil.

         At lunch, Aaron poked him sharply in the shoulder, pulling him back from his reverie. “You ok, Simon?” he asked, arching one eyebrow in his signature expression of mocking inquisitiveness.

         Simon sighed. “Yeah. Fine. Weird dreams, I guess.”

         Aaron smirked. "About which girl?" he asked flippantly. The other boys at their table chuckled, as Aaron had hoped they would, but his humor seemed lost on Simon.

         "What?" Simon seemed confused, despondent.

         "Nevermind. Don't worry about it." Aaron studied him for a moment, shrugged, and gave it up as a lost cause.

         Simon was quiet all through dinner, so that his mother checked his forehead for fever, her brow furrowed with concern.

         "Sure you're feeling ok, Simon?" she asked for the third time.

         He nodded, clearly off in his own world. This response failed to satisfy her.

         "Well, you don't look ok to me," she declared, suddenly the highpower business executive, stifling his mild objections with a raised hand. "I'm keeping you home from school tomorrow and calling Dr. Mays first thing in the morning."

         "If you ask me," put in Julian as he helped himself to another baked potato, "he's just totally insane. I've been saying it for years and now it's finally starting to show."

         "Well, I didn't ask you, did I?" rebuked their mother, not in the mood for sibling rivalry. Her tone softened with worry as she addressed her older son. "Really, Simon, if you're not feeling well you can go and lie down."

         With more eagerness than he’d done anything all day, he trudged up the stairs and fell into bed.

         The beach was the same. No – not quite the same. Its fragile, silent loveliness was unchanged. He could still smell the heavy salt smell of the ocean. He could still feel the wind in his hair and the sand between his toes. And yet – it was not the same.

         “Simon,” said someone directly behind him.

         He spun around, suddenly afraid; he’d never looked inland before. There stood a young woman. Her hair was dark and curling, and he was not sure whether it were black or very dark green. It was wet, and its damp shadow fell on the front of her sand-colored robe. Her skin was very pale, and her eyes were very dark. Simon knew that she was a part of this place, that she belonged here as the sea belonged here. And just as surely, he knew that he did not belong. That was the difference – the intrusion was his own, the stranger was himself.

         She spoke again, and her voice did not pierce the stillness as his own would. “You know this is the last time.”

         He did know. He nodded. He could not put his question into words.

         She smiled, privy to his quandary. “Who knows why one is called to this place? What is purpose in the face of all this?” She raised her hands to indicate the infinity of blue-grey coastline. “This place is eternal. It has existed since long before men dreamed life had a meaning.”

         The words dropped from her lips like gems, musical and beyond his comprehension. Sadly, he was moved to ask: “Is it for forever?”

         Again the smile. “Who knows?”

         And then: “Look, a gift from the sea.” A wavelet carried a lovely, abandoned conch shell and set it down beside him. “Take it,” she told him. Wordlessly, he obeyed. “It holds the voice of this place. Perhaps, someday, it shall lead you back.” And then she smiled at him, and it was as if the clouds had blown past and the sun shone down with a truer, brighter light than before, and suddenly Simon was awake in his bed, clutching a conch shell.